Topological metastability supported by thermal fluctuation upon formation of chiral soliton lattice in $$\hbox {CrNb}_3\hbox {S}_6$$

Topological magnetic structure possesses topological stability characteristics that make it robust against disturbances which are a big advantage for data processing or storage devices of spintronics; nonetheless, such characteristics have been rarely clarified. This paper focused on the formation of chiral soliton lattice (CSL), a one-dimensional topological magnetic structure, and provides a discussion of its topological stability and influence of thermal fluctuation. Herein, CSL responses against change of temperature and applied magnetic field were investigated via small-angle resonant soft X-ray scattering in chromium niobium sulfide ($$\hbox {CrNb}_3\hbox {S}_6$$ CrNb 3 S 6 ). CSL transformation relative to the applied magnetic field demonstrated a clear agreement with the theoretical prediction of the sine-Gordon model. Further, there were apparent differences in the process of chiral soliton creation and annihilation, discussed from the viewpoint of competing between thermal fluctuation and the topological metastability.

Electrocatalytically Active Niobium Sulfide Modified Carbon Cloth for Lithium–Sulfur Batteries

We report a simple novel annealing technique for the synthesis of NbS2 nanoflakes. The synthesized NbS2 flakes were characterized well with different spectroscopic and microscopic techniques and confirmed they are in 3R-NbS2 polymorph structure, which is semiconducting in nature. Later, they were successfully deposited onto carbon cloth (CC) and tested for Li–S cell. Lithium–sulfur batteries suffer from polysulfide (PS) shuttling effects which hinder the performance of the cell. High capacity fade, slow redox kinetics, and the low cyclability of cells are just some of the many problems caused by the shuttling effect that hinder the viability of the battery. Herein, we utilized the catalytic nature of NbS2 along with the high conductivity of CC for better PS adsorption, their liquid to solid conversion, fast PS redox kinetics which substantially enhanced the overall Li–S performance.